TORQUEMADA, THOMAS. — Nephew of the preceding, born in Valladolid around 1420, died in Avila on 16 September 1498. He entered the Dominican Order at the convent of S. Paolo in Valladolid within the Congregation of Strict Observance.
He served as prior in Segovia, confessor to the sovereigns Ferdinand and Isabella, and a member of their Council. In 1479, he oversaw the establishment of the monumental convent of S. Tommaso in Avila. Commissioned by the sovereigns to organize the Tribunal of the Inquisition, he soon became its head for Castile on 26 August and for Aragon on 17 October 1483, and he drafted its laws: *Compilación de las Instrucciones de la santa Inquisición*, based on medieval inquisitorial legislation modified in its constitution according to royal interests. Rigid in his principles, he aimed at the religious unification of Spain, for which he deemed the expulsion of the Jews and strict surveillance of converts necessary; the number of those prosecuted and condemned cannot be determined (as has been attempted) because, for polemical reasons, it was certainly greatly exaggerated.